The Matt Walsh Show - April 06, 2024


Matt Walsh Reviews Beyonce's ＂JOLENE＂ Cover [Weekly Walsh Original]


Episode Stats


Length

9 minutes

Words per minute

194.6473

Word count

1,777

Sentence count

132

Harmful content

Misogyny

12

sentences flagged

Hate speech

4

sentences flagged


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

Beyonc s rendition of Dolly Parton s classic Jolene has been widely panned by critics, who have accused Beyonc of replacing everything that makes modern pop music great with something that makes it terrible.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Misogyny classifications generated with MilaNLProc/bert-base-uncased-ear-misogyny .
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
00:00:00.000 And every once in a while, I'll take a position that I realize is risky.
00:00:03.260 Even while I'm saying it out loud on camera,
00:00:05.240 I am conscious of the fact that I may well come to regret having said what I'm saying.
00:00:09.240 You might argue that it makes me imprudent and reckless to say something publicly
00:00:12.360 that I know I might soon wish I didn't say.
00:00:14.240 Or you might argue that it makes me courageous.
00:00:16.160 At least I'll try to argue the latter case, but the former is probably more true most of the time.
00:00:20.760 That took courage, my friend.
00:00:21.840 Either way, the problem with venturing out onto a precarious limb, of course,
00:00:25.140 is that the limb might snap and send you hurtling down to the forest floor.
00:00:28.580 And that is what happened to me after I publicly stated a few weeks ago
00:00:31.740 that Beyonce's new country song wasn't that bad.
00:00:34.480 Well, there's your problem right there.
00:00:36.500 I didn't say that it was good objectively.
00:00:37.980 I didn't say that I would be putting it on my Spotify playlist.
00:00:40.340 I just said it wasn't terrible.
00:00:42.300 It was catchy.
00:00:43.200 It was kind of not awful.
00:00:45.000 It wasn't much of a ringing endorsement,
00:00:46.600 but it was the closest thing to an endorsement that I've ever given Beyonce.
00:00:49.660 And so it was inevitable that I would live to rue the day
00:00:52.280 that I vaguely praised one of her songs, sort of.
00:00:54.620 And in fact, she's made me regret it multiple times in the intervening weeks,
00:00:57.460 but the real catastrophe struck when Beyonce released her new country album
00:01:01.220 and one of the other songs on that album.
00:01:04.480 And it's Beyonce's rendition of the classic Dolly Parton hit, Jolene.
00:01:08.380 If you're a red-blooded American, then you are well familiar with the original song.
00:01:11.620 It is Dolly's mournful plea to the woman, Jolene, who is trying to steal her man. 0.86
00:01:17.200 Your beauty is beyond compare with flaming locks of auburn hair with ivory skin
00:01:22.520 and eyes of emerald green.
00:01:27.660 Your smile is like a breath of spring.
00:01:30.280 Your voice is soft like summer rain.
00:01:32.500 And I cannot compete with you, Jolene.
00:01:36.240 Now, what makes this song unique and interesting,
00:01:38.760 which has caused it to resonate over the five decades since it was made,
00:01:41.600 is the vulnerability and the heartbreak and the longing in the lyrics and the performance.
00:01:46.680 Dolly Parton is insecure, fearful, desperately in love with a man 0.97
00:01:49.820 who she believes she cannot afford to lose.
00:01:51.580 Those opening lyrics are iconic because of how they kind of invert expectations.
00:01:55.200 She's singing to the woman who is trying to break up her relationship,
00:01:57.940 but instead of attacking her, she praises her rival's beauty.
00:02:01.000 And already there's more poetry in those opening lines
00:02:03.140 than in every Beyonce song ever written.
00:02:04.900 Now, when I heard that Beyonce was covering the song,
00:02:09.680 I, of course, knew that her cover wouldn't get within a thousand miles of Dolly's original.
00:02:14.220 Beyonce just doesn't have the soul and gravitas to do a song like that any justice. 1.00
00:02:17.480 But at the same time, in a weird way, I was initially impressed with the idea.
00:02:21.080 Because after all, it is a very tender, very feminine song
00:02:23.740 expressing deep insecurity and vulnerability.
00:02:26.500 And Beyonce just doesn't make songs like that. 1.00
00:02:28.160 So this seemed to be an interesting departure.
00:02:30.980 But then I listened to Beyonce's version.
00:02:33.520 Here's a little bit of it.
00:02:34.900 Oh, well, there you go.
00:02:58.600 Just when you think that Beyonce might be growing ever so slightly as an artist and a person,
00:03:03.600 she proves you wrong.
00:03:04.660 It turns out that she has taken this song,
00:03:06.300 full of pain and yearning and emotional honesty,
00:03:08.920 and turned it into yet another mediocre girl boss anthem. 1.00
00:03:12.120 Who runs the world?
00:03:13.440 Girl! 0.97
00:03:14.120 Who runs the world?
00:03:15.400 She has, in other words, taken everything that makes the song great
00:03:18.300 and replaced it with everything that makes modern pop music terrible.
00:03:21.700 Now, in Beyonce's molestation of the original,
00:03:23.500 she sings,
00:03:23.900 your beautiful beyond compare takes more than beauty and seductive stares
00:03:26.320 to come between a family and a happy man.
00:03:27.720 Jolene, I'm a woman too.
00:03:28.900 The games you play are nothing new,
00:03:30.100 so you don't want no heat with me, Jolene.
00:03:31.900 And later she adds,
00:03:33.320 but you don't want this smoke,
00:03:34.260 so shoot your shot with someone else.
00:03:35.460 And then sings,
00:03:36.460 Jolene, I know I'm a queen, Jolene.
00:03:38.240 I'm still a Creole banjee bitch from Louisiana. 0.99
00:03:40.760 Don't try me.
00:03:42.120 And finally she warns,
00:03:43.280 I'd hate to have to act a fool.
00:03:44.660 Not classy.
00:03:45.620 Not classy at all.
00:03:47.240 De class A.
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00:05:06.640 The problem with this new version,
00:05:07.980 aside from the fact that the performance is flat
00:05:09.960 and uninteresting,
00:05:11.480 the lyrics are clunky and kind of stupid,
00:05:13.620 and that Beyonce has ripped the song's heart 1.00
00:05:16.020 out of its chest and eaten it
00:05:17.360 like some kind of nightmarish Aztec ritual.
00:05:19.900 The problem is that it lacks the vulnerability
00:05:21.980 of the original song.
00:05:24.200 In the original,
00:05:25.240 Dolly Parton is desperate. 0.98
00:05:26.820 She's worried.
00:05:27.400 She's anxious.
00:05:28.040 She's lying awake at night
00:05:29.100 listening to the man in bed next to her
00:05:30.740 as he dreams about a woman
00:05:32.380 more beautiful than herself.
00:05:34.140 In Beyonce's version,
00:05:35.440 she's a confident queen.
00:05:36.780 She's unbothered.
00:05:37.800 She's tough and independent
00:05:38.960 and perfect and wonderful and unafraid,
00:05:41.240 and her man would never cheat on her anyway.
00:05:42.760 Which, if that's the case,
00:05:44.700 then why should anyone even care about the story
00:05:47.160 you're telling us in the song?
00:05:49.380 Beyonce's the greatest.
00:05:50.280 She's a queen. 0.97
00:05:50.900 She's perfect.
00:05:51.480 Everything's perfect.
00:05:52.160 So who cares?
00:05:53.680 Your boasts are not interesting.
00:05:55.740 Boring.
00:05:56.700 They are also not relatable
00:05:58.200 to the rest of us mere mortals.
00:06:00.920 Beyonce is a strong, confident queen,
00:06:03.240 she claims.
00:06:03.760 This is your queen?
00:06:04.720 Well, the rest of us are human beings.
00:06:06.100 We're not kings and queens.
00:06:07.020 We're just, we're people.
00:06:08.120 Music at its best
00:06:09.140 expresses those universal human experiences.
00:06:11.940 But Beyonce's music 0.58
00:06:12.880 expresses nothing more
00:06:14.280 than how awesome
00:06:15.020 Beyonce thinks Beyonce is.
00:06:16.780 I'm Beyonce.
00:06:17.580 I am Beyonce always.
00:06:18.820 I can't think of anything
00:06:19.600 less interesting
00:06:20.760 than listening to a famous rich person
00:06:23.080 sing songs about how great they are.
00:06:25.700 But the thing is,
00:06:26.540 it isn't even true.
00:06:27.860 And that's the biggest problem
00:06:28.800 with just about every song
00:06:30.000 she's ever made
00:06:30.900 and with much of modern popular music generally.
00:06:33.040 It just isn't true.
00:06:35.120 It's not saying anything true
00:06:36.740 about the human experience.
00:06:38.540 It's not connecting
00:06:39.400 with anything real inside us.
00:06:41.340 Because the truth is
00:06:42.400 that any woman,
00:06:44.000 okay,
00:06:44.320 Beyonce included,
00:06:45.820 any woman
00:06:46.400 who sees another woman,
00:06:47.720 a beautiful,
00:06:48.520 radiant woman,
00:06:49.080 Absolutely.
00:06:50.040 hitting on her boyfriend
00:06:50.880 or her husband
00:06:51.420 will at some level
00:06:53.140 feel insecure and threatened.
00:06:55.080 Not.
00:06:55.540 Like no woman 1.00
00:06:56.520 would just wave that off
00:06:57.800 and say,
00:06:58.300 Whatever,
00:06:58.620 I'm a badass queen.
00:06:59.480 No man would ever leave me.
00:07:00.740 Now she might say that out loud perhaps,
00:07:02.420 but deep in her heart
00:07:03.460 she'll have doubts.
00:07:04.580 In fact,
00:07:05.020 it would have been interesting
00:07:06.160 if Beyonce's version
00:07:07.540 began
00:07:08.440 with the blustery confidence,
00:07:10.640 but then as the song went on
00:07:11.880 the cracks start to show
00:07:13.180 and she reveals herself
00:07:14.580 to be insecure
00:07:15.300 and anxious
00:07:15.720 about the situation.
00:07:16.980 That would have been
00:07:17.420 a smart artistic direction
00:07:18.920 to take it.
00:07:19.400 Write that down,
00:07:19.940 write that down.
00:07:20.480 But Beyonce has no capacity 0.97
00:07:22.620 for creativity
00:07:23.320 and has none of the
00:07:24.320 artistic intelligence
00:07:25.160 or honesty
00:07:25.620 to even conceive
00:07:26.760 of something like that.
00:07:27.820 But if it appeals
00:07:28.400 to those women
00:07:28.980 or men,
00:07:30.060 it's not because
00:07:30.920 they relate to
00:07:31.600 Beyonce's corny
00:07:32.660 feminist bravado,
00:07:34.380 but because they want
00:07:35.440 to relate to it.
00:07:36.460 That's the whole reason
00:07:37.120 people like to listen
00:07:37.920 to rappers and pop stars
00:07:39.120 brag about themselves.
00:07:40.280 It's because they,
00:07:41.320 the listeners,
00:07:42.360 want to feel
00:07:43.740 as arrogant
00:07:44.560 and self-assured
00:07:45.660 as those rappers
00:07:46.420 and pop stars
00:07:47.000 pretend to feel
00:07:47.800 about themselves.
00:07:48.680 And in reality,
00:07:49.420 Beyonce,
00:07:49.740 Beyonce is so
00:07:51.160 incredibly insecure
00:07:52.060 that she's won
00:07:53.540 like 32 Grammys
00:07:54.620 but still whines
00:07:56.260 because she hasn't
00:07:56.840 won album of the year.
00:07:57.680 She has more Grammys
00:07:58.500 than everyone
00:07:58.980 and never won album
00:07:59.920 in a year.
00:08:00.480 So even by your own
00:08:01.500 metrics,
00:08:01.940 that doesn't work.
00:08:02.800 She's won more awards
00:08:04.540 at the Grammys
00:08:05.180 than any artist
00:08:06.160 in history
00:08:07.080 and it's not enough.
00:08:08.980 That's how desperate
00:08:09.920 for affirmation
00:08:10.640 and approval
00:08:11.060 she really is.
00:08:13.100 And you know what?
00:08:13.660 That would be
00:08:14.280 an interesting subject
00:08:15.120 for a song.
00:08:15.740 If Beyonce explored
00:08:16.820 the fact
00:08:17.300 that she has praised
00:08:18.720 the world over
00:08:19.460 showered with money
00:08:21.320 and fame
00:08:22.040 and critical acclaim
00:08:22.800 and yet she still 0.79
00:08:24.060 hungers for approval.
00:08:25.540 That would be interesting.
00:08:27.160 I would listen
00:08:27.660 to a song like that.
00:08:28.780 That's the kind of thing
00:08:29.500 a real artist
00:08:30.400 who has the courage
00:08:32.280 to be vulnerable
00:08:33.340 and honest
00:08:35.380 might be able
00:08:36.780 to explore.
00:08:37.560 But Beyonce
00:08:38.000 is not a real artist.
00:08:38.980 She's a mediocre hack. 1.00
00:08:40.240 She's been making music
00:08:41.000 for 25 years
00:08:41.940 and during that entire time
00:08:43.580 she's never managed
00:08:44.420 to say one interesting
00:08:46.060 or insightful thing
00:08:47.160 ever.
00:08:48.220 She's bland
00:08:48.920 and dull
00:08:49.640 and arrogant 0.70
00:08:50.220 and also frankly
00:08:51.160 not a very good singer.
00:08:52.260 And that is why
00:08:52.900 she is today
00:08:53.900 cancel.
00:08:55.060 and I think
00:08:55.880 will continue to do
00:08:56.920 together for 3 minutes.
00:08:57.420 на
00:09:00.600 Hal
00:09:05.240 sheby
00:09:05.960 sheby
00:09:06.880 sheby
00:09:07.660 sheby